Worth a Thousand Words
by MapleleafCameo
Summary: John finds a nude photograph of Sherlock. Things change between them. Rated M. Happy Birthday SecretMoustache 2


**A/N: This is a belated birthday present for the lovely SecretMoustache2! Happy birthday! Mattsloved1 and I outlined the story and each of us chose 3 words for this story. The words are translucent, ethereal, subtle, exasperate, reverence, authentic. We based this idea on a photo I found on Tumblr (which I cannot find again:P) which was an absolutely stunning and tasteful (tasty? lol) picture of BC:)**

**As usual I do not own:) But a girl can dream!**

**Worth a Thousand Words**

He hadn't recognized it for what it was.

It was the most surprising thing, really; a gradual surprise that snuck upon him, tapped him on the shoulder and tuned his world inside out.

He'd harboured a curiosity and perhaps had wondered. There had been unspoken moments, particularly during this last case, where the looks traded back and forth between them might have meant something more, but he wasn't sure. The line between wanting and needing and wishing was becoming thinner, for the doctor at least.

But until he saw the photo he really didn't know.

If he was honest, he'd acknowledged all along he'd been attracted, but sometimes it's hard to be honest until it stares you point blank naked in the face.

He'd been tidying, putting away books Sherlock had left out from their latest case. Sometimes he despaired of trying to figure out the detective's library system, but he decided he'd try putting away a few of the more obvious ones. He'd too many books in his arms and as he was bending to pick up one more, the one that had been left on his chair, _Flora and Fauna of Southern England _slipped off the top of the pile and fell open. Swearing under his breath, he'd bent down to pick it up and something slipped out from in between the pages, a flash of colour and nothing more until it fluttered face down upon the carpet.

He picked it up and turned it over. And he knew. It was simply there, an acknowledgement of what was buried deep inside, perhaps because it would spoil the friendship, perhaps because he was impossible and frustrating and too much like trying to love fire and electricity or perhaps it was harder than taming nature and putting a collar on it and call it his.

The picture was raw sexuality but yet there was a guarded innocence about the pose as well, even thought the subject was completely naked. He looked younger than John had ever seen him. His piebald coloured eyes gazed at the camera with a look John had never really seen before. They were unnaturally quiet and caught the eye of the viewer. His head, hair shorter than when they had met, lay on one arm, the other tucked slightly under but in front. He lay on his stomach and the picture ended at the swell of the curve of buttocks. The sleepy look in his eyes and the tossed unruly curls made it look as if he'd just woken from sleep.

The man in the picture transcended the ethereal. He was fae and ghost and spirit but oh so flesh and blood. John's mouth was sapped of every drop of moisture and his heart made a feathered clamor in his chest. It might have been the sound of a desperately unrequited love, a colour known only to those who see their perfect match but can't have it. Reverence and devotion held his unsteady heart in temperate hands, but he felt he was not fit to venerate this man. These were only some of the things he carried within as he looked at the picture.

He wasn't sure how long he stood looking at it but a noise at his elbow caused him to jump and unkindly returned him to earth from the stratosphere he had been visiting.

"Jeezus! Mrs. Hudson!" he almost shouted in the exasperated voice of someone rudely pulled from potentially embarrassing fantasies.

"Oh, I'm so sorry Doctor Watson. You were lost in thought and I called to you, but you didn't hear me." She bent to pick up the picture he had dropped in his surprise. Just as he was about to warn her she turned it over and stilled.

Much to his amazement a sublime yet subtle smile creased her face and she nodded thoughtfully.

"I remember this. It was a couple of months before you two met and moved in. He was working a case. Some young male models were being attacked, raped and killed, poor boys. Nasty business. He needed some shots for a portfolio. The photographer he suspected and rightly so was only interested in nudes. One of Mrs. Turner's lads is an amateur photographer and set up the shots. Hmmm. I thought he'd burned them all afterward. They were gorgeous. Tasteful you know."

John's mouth fell open during the ramble of words that poured from Mrs. Hudson's mouth.

"Why are you looking so shocked? I can appreciate a beautiful man just as much as the next woman. I may be older than you but I'm not dead," And she winked at John and passed the picture back.

Then she tilted her head to look at him. "I find it rather interesting that this picture turns up now. Perhaps you should ask him about it. I think it might answer some of those questions you keep turning over in your mind. You worry too much, John," she said kindly and with another frankly naughty wink, she turned and left the flat. John never did find out what she'd come up for.

John looked down at the photograph. There was a moment of stuttered palpitations and a touch of confusion, but then came the clarity of thought and the claim of authentic emotions that sometimes come upon someone when they are about to take their life in their hands. He could almost see where this would lead, if he were right. He needed to know. He needed to see the look on Sherlock's face. Was there a reason that this particular photograph was here?

John found his feet taking him to the door of Sherlock's bedroom before he could stop himself. His hand reached out and turned the knob. He didn't stop to consider it, weigh his options in his usual thoughtful way. If he did he might turn, put the picture back and always live with the regret of not knowing and he didn't think he could do that.

The room was dark. His eyes were slow to adjust, but he could hear the soft intake of breath coming from the slumbering figure on the bed. There was a shift of a body stirring slightly and then all was still once again. John's eyes altered enough to see that Sherlock slept in a pose similar to the one in the picture, the only difference being a light sheet covering the lower half of the sleeping detective. The anticipation, the titillation and impulse of his actions made his heart race faster.

He slowly approached the bed and found himself, voyeuristically staring in a similar way at the figure as he had at the picture. Here lay a sleeping sculpture of foreign and rare beauty, here was the simple pleasure of seeing the hurricane genius stilled and purified into an ideal of himself, the innocence and the unrestrained sexuality fighting for space in the same man. It was all laid bare, figuratively and literally in front of the doctor and John was almost overwhelmed with the wellspring of emotions that raged through his heart.

John hadn't moved or made any noise, but the simple fact that someone was staring at him was enough to cause the detective to break through the layers of sleep and rouse at the feeling of being watched. His preternatural sense of awareness felt the presence tingle on his skin. First there was a brief frown on his face and then a flutter of lashes. Much to John's delight and utter mortification, Sherlock rolled onto his back and stretched languidly, before he rubbed his eyes in a free and endearing manner.

As he became cognizant of John's presence, his mind waking up much more quickly than the doctor's ever would, those amazing eyes honed in on the picture in John's hand and he sat up in one sudden movement of elegance and grace that only Sherlock could ever achieve even when covered by just a sheet. The keen edged vision continued to gather data and skimmed over the doctor's form and noted everything, stripping his soul and from the slight smirk that turned up the corners of his mouth he was stripping other things as well. His notice of the picture in his hand seemed to signal that everything was on the table and left for perusal. The doctor hadn't felt this translucent and exposed, even during their first meeting.

Sherlock stared through him and then patted the bed, nothing sexual in the move or the invitation but heat blazed through John, a conflagration that he knew would not be stopped once he sat on his flatmate's bed. The detective scooted back against the headboard, a slight frown pulling his eyebrows down.

John stood there not sure what to do. He clutched the picture tighter to his chest. A slim hand, imperious and commanding, was held out and John glanced down at the photo, reluctance in his every movement as he slowly held it out and placed the photograph on the upturned palm.

Sherlock glanced at the photo and the smirk turned into a genuine smile, not John felt, directed at the photo but more at the results. Sherlock looked at John and then leaned forword, his free hand raised up and cupped John's face. He slid down and took the hand that had held the picture and coaxed it open. He lifted it up to his lips and placed a kiss in the centre, not chaste, not in friendship nor in any way could it be called safe. It was a slow, deep kiss that branded the flesh and marked him as Sherlock's in ways he never would have been able to name.

"Thank you for returning this," Sherlock's voice was impossibly deep, from sleep and something else. "I feel as if I owe you. It wouldn't do for Mycroft to find this. Not only would it give him ammunition it would afford him too much amusement at my expense. I was very careful not to let him know about the others."

John turned his head and wished the sound of his heart beating wasn't as loud as he feared. "You left that in the book deliberately."

Sherlock looked surprised in only the way John could ever make him. "John…"

"It was in a book that was on my chair. You anticipated this."

The glorious head nodded, "Yes, I hoped. There have been signs…indications. I wasn't sure and I, umm, felt this was perhaps one way to open the conversation. If you weren't interested you would just hand it back, I would see it as an experiment that hadn't proved to be fruitful. If you were, well it was an ice breaker." His smile seemed to be a little unsure. He continued to hold John captive with his eyes and the older man swallowed heavily, tried to speak, tried once more and all that came out to his embarrassment and frustration was, "Sherlock…"

Before the protests could start, before they second-guessed themselves, the other man pulled John closer and didn't give him any more time to think, covering him with hot and filthy kisses that pulled John apart. He shuddered and gasped in the long arms and was undone even before anything had happened. Sherlock whispered in John's ear, "I owe you John. I owe you in so many ways. I owe you for your friendship and your bravery. I owe you for your steadfast heart and loyalty. I owe you for you, simply and fearlessly, coming in here to return a picture to me."

John ran his hands down the warm expanse of the silk-skinned bask and clutched at the detective as the other began to surreptitiously remove all of John's clothes along with his reservations and any inhibitions that may have been lingering. He then turned him and continued to cover him with reckless and intoxicating kisses.

There was a feeling of each reaching into the others chest and removing the singular organ that functioned simply to pump blood but contained a world of emotions and they laid their hearts out together, side by side. The two hearts merged until they couldn't tell were one began and the other ended. Sherlock teased and tamed and caressed John and held him through the tremors and the cries of passion and John melted into Sherlock's skin and held him down and painted strokes and touches until the shockwave of desire swept through and left them breathless on the bed and then later after the caresses and sighs, they realised they had waited for this, had been waiting for this forever and a day and Sherlock wrapped himself around John as if he would never divide them and they would be found days and weeks later moulded together and brushed his nose across the muscular and scarred shoulder and up the neck and into the blond and grey hair.

He could tell John was slipping over the edge into sleep when he asked, "John?"

"Yes, Sherlock," came a murmured reply.

"You may keep my picture."

He felt rather than saw John's smile.

"Thanks, Sherlock."

"John?"

"Yes?"

"Can I keep your heart?"

The smile broadened until it filled the room.

"It was always yours Sherlock. Always."

One last kiss was planted on the back of a sleepy head and the two snuggled down together to start their next adventure.


End file.
